they're puppets here in their so-called balanced budget about and with great power comes great responsibility especially in media so in light of the murdoch hacking scandal should we be more wary of media monopolies. last night house republicans passed their crash slash and burn excuse me cut cap and balance plan out of the house despite the fact it has no chance of being passed by the senators signed by the president is right with time running out and so our nation defaults on its debts republicans are playing games included in this absurd package is a balanced budget amendment that returns government spending to the one nine hundred sixty six levels back in america had one hundred million fewer people plan could also require a twenty five percent cut to every single government program from social security to medicare to veterans benefits just to meet the new radically lower spending

threshold but here's the part republicans love the most moving forward under the balanced budget amendment a two thirds majority will be needed for any new tax increases as we've learned over the last two years two thirds is hard to come by so this bill will essentially enshrined the bush tax cuts into law indefinitely so who or what is behind this new push by republicans for a balanced budget amendment that makes it impossible to raise taxes on millionaires and billionaires to meet the american legislative exchange council a corporate funded right wing organization in charge of writing custom made legislation to spread to republican lawmakers across the country to push in their respective state legislatures or in congress itself want to alex hottest items amendments that require supermajorities to pass any new tax increases already sixteen states around the country have fallen victim to this super majority rule including arizona. california and colorado and are now off when they're trying to

close their respective budget gaps so what is it that alec is trying to do in congress the liver of death blow to our federal government's finances more about alec is lisa gray's executive director of the center for media democracy and one of the creators of the website alex exposed dot org lisa welcome thanks tom happy thank you great to have you with us first of all just an overview what is alec how does it work sure alec is described itself as one of the largest groups of bipartisan legislators in the country at state legislators but in fact almost its entire budget is funded by everything but legislative dues and spending primarily by big corporations these corporations pay a fee to be a member and they. cast forces on alec task forces including these taxes on taxes and budgets corporations have an equal vote with politicians they vote behind closed doors with politicians on bills to radically change the law in the u.s. state by state and many of these provisions have also been introduced in congress

including the sort of what are called super majority requirements that are really super minority super majority requirements in essence a small minority of people can stop a majority of americans from getting the tax increases they need to pay for basic government services all at the service of the alec agenda you know where i live in oregon where the victim of one of these things and they came in to sell this modify the constitution so there's an engine initiative with incredibly slick advertising and you know you know do you want to protect your state and you people people thought it was the right thing to do it's just it's amazing how effective they were . was a poll way rick one of the founders of he was he was the founder of the primary founder of alec let me just share with you and with if you haven't seen it with our viewers a little clip of paul weyrich this is from the one nine hundred eighty s. he was very very big in ronald reagan's campaign claimed a lot of credit for ronald reagan becoming president and this is him speaking in a church to a group. of republican religious leaders and republican activists are aware. how

many of our course. what i call for. good government they want everybody to vote. i don't want everybody to vote elections are won by a majority of people they never have been from the beginning of all concrete and they are not. going to look for it in the elections quite candidly go drop out of bocconi populist go our leverage in the elections goes up as the voting populace goes down i've noticed a bunch of states passing voter id laws this is coming out it certainly is the voter id bills we've seen in some states identical to the voter id model legislation that we've posted on our site alec exposed or we've analyzed those bills and bills disenfranchise millions of americans americans who are older who don't have the required state id but who have federal identification or are that if they've been using for years even the poll workers know that even if their neighbor

it would also disenfranchise millions of college students if their id didn't go to their college address even though they were residents of that city they would be barred from voting and so this is nothing short of an effort to disenfranchise millions of american voters including primarily voters who tend to vote democratic this is the fulfillment of all way worse than nine hundred eighty three mm if mr were alive i suppose that he would be applauding these voter i.d. bills right now you are very proud which is a cost of by legislation you know if i'm a small businessman i own the show and the radio show if i want to without a corporate checkbook what would it cost for me to sit in a room with legislators and say i vote in favor of this you know and whatever the majority is when it's right sure. if you were a legislator it cost you fifty bucks a year to be a member although some legislators are so cheap they have the taxpayers pay that bill for them. but i'm not i'm a businessman so that's going to cost me as a businessman you can pay between seven thousand and twenty five thousand dollars a year. to be

a member and then you can pay an additional premium of twenty five hundred to ten thousand dollars a year to be a member of an al accounts force if you share their agenda if you are one of their task forces you get to vote as equals in what alec calls a synergistic finner just pick a partnership a unique private public partnership in which both politicians and corporations vote behind closed doors on legislation that then approved by alec and then it's introduced in your state legislature to benefit your business without any disclosure to corporations voted on it what an extraordinary opportunity. industry gets three billion dollars a year in just you know checks written from the government corporate welfare i don't know if the start of alec approaches are we will industry lobbying for it but i could go into alec meeting and i can say ok let's have a let's pass a bill this is the talk show hosts get a you know million dollar subsidy and all if you could get other corporations to scratch you could scratch their back they could scratch your back and the oil companies are one of the biggest long time funders of alec the label spent millions on alex exxon it's a major member out after the back of companies and lo and behold one of alex

resolutions is against any tax on windfall profits of oil companies because of course the right people are clamoring for no taxes on oil companies right alec legislators have signed on to alec provisions pushed by alec corporations and voted on by alec corporations should and it's not that unrealistic you know maybe i could get some of the right wing talk show hosts along with me and then we could all agree that well at least they will talk about how wonderful the welcome trees or the tobacco company is i'd rather buy it and then we'll get a subsidy as. possible are companies actually buying legislation is what i mean it sounds like for under one hundred thousand bucks i can participate in alec in a very significant for under fifty i can participate in a very significant way and actually get was passed that might return to me hundreds of thousands millions tens of millions in the case of the oil in the back of companies hundreds of millions or even billions of dollars this is like the best investment ever well the american coalition is one of the standing members of alec and it has extol. quite publicly how their members want to turn the world around

for them in terms of legislation to privatized available on industry certainly corrections corporation of america and other big companies have also benefited in the tune to the tune of millions of a person a private prison it is and they lobby for laws that keep people in jail longer and heavier penalties for small crimes so that they get more customers that's right and also the public schools so the public school of alec is co-chaired by an online school a school company and so the resolutions of privatized public education would give huge tax dollar taxpayer handouts to private companies that don't have the same expenses as public schools like athletic athletic programs school buses bricks and mortar but an online an online school company co-chairs that task force and so this is a way to take take profit out of the taxpayer dollar and give it give the money to go to school and only twice before he ran to show up and get all this morning it's incredible you know benito mussolini in the early thirty's dissolved parliament replaced it with the company would have thought. it was the chamber of fascist

corporations instead of an elected official from a from a region being a member of parliament now the largest corporation in each region so their representative or the person that they chose as their representative how is this different and i think that's an excellent question the fact is that american have a lot of questions they should be asking about alec and about what alec is doing in the states we know that alec has private co-chairs for every state in the country but we don't know who those co-chairs are so in secret those private co-chairs work with the state chairman of alec to raise money for so-called scholarships which are really nothing more nothing less than gifts to legislators to attend fancy conferences like the one coming up in new orleans on august third and so these private sector co-chairs these corporate co-chairs work with alec chairman state chairman elected representatives to basically ensure that this legislation is introduced in the state and ensure that there is money to basically find legislators to travel to resorts to attend our meetings and we were right to know.

well where it has given birth to a baby this is incredible lisa thanks so much for being with us and for the game were you doing and once again the web site is alec expos got bored not about alec baldwin about alec at the american legislative exchange thank you for the on the lookout for more alec legislation hitting your state and ask your local republican lawmakers why they're outsourcing their jobs to corporate funded right wing think tanks. it was a bizarre day in the u.k. yesterday media mogul rupert murdoch and son james murdoch appeared before the u.k. parliament to answer questions about what they knew about the phone hacking scandal in sweden britain and the elder murdoch wasn't interested in taking any responsibility for the fiasco. this time of the open with. this whole fiasco. you have no doubt then who is shortly after that answer is shaving cream pie was thrown at murdoch proving that no matter what murdoch is involved in a matter how big the story is it always devolves into infotainment and spectacle

then today more allegations were leveled at news corp from the u.k. parliament house of commons report alleges that news international blocked the first investigation into the phone hacking scandal report reads we deplore the response of news international to the original investigation of the happening is almost impossible to escape the conclusion that they were deliberately trying to thwart a criminal investigation and prime minister david cameron squared off against attractors in parliament as we desperately tries to save face and sever ties to murdoch's media empire cameron had this to say about what lessons patients need to learn from the scandal. i think we all need to be clear particular the two main points is that the level of contact has been very great that we did spend too much time frankly trying to get it get get on with media companies to get all message across and as a result we put on the backburner too often the last government lost what position we put on the back burner too often the issues are. to regulate the media that's

the mistake that we made we put out to be honest about it so with the u.k. poised to start regulating the media again i want to lean i would say it's cause what lessons can we learn from murdoch gate on this side of you joining me now to talk about this issue is its partner and strategic communications consultant at bullfight strategies and former president of media matters for america welcome thank you for you to have you with us in recent weeks foxes launched an all out assault on the organization you were the c.e.o. of the matters where the president of encouraging viewers to petition the i.r.s. and to pull the media matters tax exempt status is a sign of desperation ok tell me about well i mean. folks are being matters obviously very very careful what i spent five years i mean i was three years as president we know exactly what the rules are what the lines are and there's no question that you know fact checking the wires that come out of fox news or the

come out of emerson b.c. when they come out of the new york times which media matters is like quite a bit of is educational and it's see through permissable and it's something that we obviously spend a lot of time you know be concerned about papers seriously so of course it's absolutely a scare tactic is fox at risk of losing their legitimacy in the in the legitimacy they have with their viewers in the united states as a consequence of what's going on in the u.k. or is has that fire is that you know they're working hard to hold that or will you think it will there are they are i've looked at i think we we had others may have made a little lot of difference and really educating informing you know other journalists mainstream media folks about the fact that fox is not a news organization their political their political offers are been acting as such for the past two years now what does it take to get to their viewership of the really they're watching every day well now we're seeing news corp emerge as a major criminal enterprise you know that is engaged and bribing police officers wiretapping. thousands and thousands of stars and politicians and and our last

minutes as well possibly even here in the united states we think that he's the guardian is reporting that it's not just possibly isolated to the news of the world paper in the u.k. but also to the sun which is the largest daily in london and yet sean hannity has yet to discuss this on foxtel and then bill o'reilly is defending them first time in april and of course you know james can say he had no knowledge and rupert can say he had no knowledge but you know were dark yes to what extent is this. is the murdoch media empire structured as a kingdom rather than a corporation and we're talking about you know a hereditary. whatever the word it i know it what it's all it's i mean it's almost feudal in nature you know that you have all these different division heads that report directly to rupert murdoch and you know i have heard many many times that those that are writing of age are publication of his they're hearing from him once a week and he has you know really absolute control you know obviously there's

a board but they're his board and so he has an enormous american troy he built and he built that empire himself and in fact you know over the last year and a half in the press we've seen a lot of fighting between his kids about who's going to take over but it's not will roger ailes get a big job you know we'll go to someone else it's which of rupert skewers or rupert murdoch's kids are going to take over the empire sort of very much as a kingdom it's interesting he gets any it's possible with all the news of the world was hacking we know they were they were hacking things about the same time that he stanley in a person is scientists got their emails act and some of the ad lib before yeah and some of their disparaging remarks about colleagues and just kind of backbiting normal stuff human stuff and then thoughts turn because i mean they just trumpeted this constantly and varco absolutely you know climate gate is right to destroy the entire the entire climate change movement right in every every significant investigation of the scientists at. it has come up clean i mean you know that's the

way they've been vindicated but you wouldn't know that if you watch fox news or is it possible that it was the murdoch empire that hacked them because scotland yard was supposed to find the hackers and they never did now we know scott yard was being bribed or blackmailed or whatever by the by the murdoch empire and not to look into them and you know and news of the world was breaking the story to me i mean you know i don't have the evidence here to say that definitively that's the case i think it's why we need investigations here in the united states is that it's in the it's in the interest of every american you know whether you're conservative or you're a democrat or a liberal you want to be able to trust that the news that you're getting is actually accurate that the people are engaging in criminal activity to deliver to you and we've already seen fox just fox and for years that news corp aside we know what's going on with kind of this you know increasing pressure and in this here picture of this is a large criminal enterprise a coordinated criminal enterprise i have a hard time believing it didn't go over to fox which is really kind of the crown

jewel of the entire empire but if you even just look at the way fox is held in the last year or so aggressively courting candidates creating folks like mark rubio out of out of whole cloth and gave them a lot of us. all of the farmers that they were doing for republicans and their folks for doing this is very very similar to miti to the very cozy and close relationship that david cameron was talking about just a clip earlier in the segment in our in our in our last minute here i'd like you to put on your now you're a political consultant hat. what are your thoughts on the gang of six and this this grand deal that obama seems to be going for i think presents a tough place i mean this is a really really really serious issue and i you know i spent a couple years as an investment banker so i understand how you know truly how serious this is his face looks pained you know because it's a right to be a cuban missile crisis but it's a self-inflicted wound. and so i'm very very concerned that we have. a bunch of

folks in congress that aren't really serious not understand what they're dealing with bill or similar fusions. we've got to get it get ceiling increase immediately it's the equivalent of basically charging up your credit cards and then saying you know what i'm not going to pay the bill every american knows that will ruin your credit they bought a car they drove it off the lot now they don't want to pay for we can't afford their fifty thousand agreed eric thanks for being here tonight they hear it see it . coming out ideally take on how the united states can take our politics back from big meet. let's not forget that we had an apartheid regime right here.

i think. even when the oil. we never got that says they're going to keep you safe get ready because you give them freedom. you know sometimes you see a story and it seems so bleak you think you understand it and then you glimpse something else and you hear or see some other part of it and realized everything you thought you know. i'm sorry is a big issue. for

. the good the bad and the very her papers her book. ok let's start this over packed aphasia silly ugly good. bye out ten days after nine eleven by and was shot in the face by a white supremacist who went to a shooting rampage in

a dallas gas station the aim of killing as many muslims as he could to other muslim men were killed in the rampage but biologists barely survived although we know suffers from partial blindness as for the shooter marc anthony stroman he was scheduled to be executed for his crimes today in texas but there's a loss in your last several months biology has been petitioning the state to save strawman's life why because his muslim faith does not call for revenge as we on told the new york times if they hurt you don't take revenge or give them move on it will bring something good to you and my islamic faith teaches. this well let's hope this story silences those who are trying to spread is on the for around america the bad there are lies a republican chairman of the house oversight committee and former small time criminal now wealthiest man in the house of representatives jumped on the bandwagon with other republicans to question the august second debt limit deadline in a radio interview on monday isis of this but we should not be having

a discussion with the artificial deadline of august second set by the president so the president could extort. a deal through his reelection period artificial deadline ice is basically echoing the words of fellow republican louie gohmert who argued the august second deadline is only in place to coincide with the president's birth thing the reality is we already hit our debt limit back in may and right now we're working on borrowed time and that borrowed time will run out on august second and as long as irresponsible republicans like their allies to keep downplaying the seriousness of the situation and we will indeed default and every single american will feel the effects of an economic calamity and the very very ugly congressman allen west this guy has one term written all over a republican congressman from florida wrote a piece for the right wing web site red country in which he labeled obama supporters as threats to the gene pool west wrote i believe we are headed toward

the ultimate ideological clash in america i must confess when i see anyone with an obama two thousand and twelve bumper sticker i recognize them as a threat to the gene pool ideological clash threat to the gene pool is allen west suddenly taking notes from going on on how to create a pure america that's very very. bright. it was dangerous monopoly there is a media monopoly today the u.k. is finding that lesson out the hard way and it's a lesson we here in america need to take note of because we're headed down the same road to start with italy though a place where the power of a medium really is on display for the entire world to see with prime minister silvio berlusconi ferals tony started out as a cruise ship lounge singer and small time hustler and then he got

a newspaper then a small television station then of radio station then another t.v. station then another newspaper then another radio station into the t.v. station then another newspaper then a radio network then a t.v. network and suddenly berlusconi ended up owning about ninety five percent of the media scene in italy and we control the information in italy berlusconi jumped into politics and we didn't know what he ended up being the prime minister of italy and despite the fact that there was going he has since been accused of everything from tax fraud to false accounting to corruption to bribery to perjury to mafia good allusion to eighteen terrorist organizations and most recently to participating in sex parties with underage prostitutes there was conan is still in power as prime minister he's one of the most corrupt politicians in the world and he has overseen italy's freedom of the press downgraded from free like the rest of europe in the developed world to only partly free italy is one of only two nations in the western world that doesn't have a free press but berlusconi is still in power why because he owns the media and the

main difference between silvio berlusconi and rupert murdoch is that murdoch isn't interested in being a politician but the u.s. . is interested in political power and when murdoch came to the u.k. in the one nine hundred sixty s. and bought the news of the world newspaper in sixty eight and then bought another newspaper the sun a year later in one thousand nine hundred eighty nine and then bought the times. and the sunday times in one thousand nine hundred one and then bought a share of the highly profitable satellite t.v. network b. sky b. in one thousand nine hundred murdoch finally had enough media holdings to sway u.k. politics to make prime ministers leap at his beck and call murdoch had an open door invitation with former british prime minister gordon brown and current prime minister david cameron as long as he entered number ten downing street through the back door tony blair flew to australia to bad murdoch for his support and when it was all said and done as we're learning now the corrupt tentacles of rupert murdoch's media empire wrapped around not just the british news media and the

british government and even the british police force shooting off a black ink of distrust around the very same institutions that are supposed to foster trust between citizens and their democratic government today that trust in the u.k. is broken so how long will it be before americans realize that the control of the british political system that murdoch sees is very similar to the power he has in america with his ownership of the wall street journal the new york post fox news and t.v. stations all around the country just like every prime minister since margaret thatcher has had to kiss rupert murdoch's feet to get elected so too does pretty much every republican in the united states the fact is that no republican politician in america can rise to a significant national office against the disapproval of murdoch and his very well paid attack dogs like sean hannity it would have a snowball's chance in hell of winning the white house if they can't win the fox news republican primary. that's not the dr see that's corporatocracy no single man

or company should be allowed to have that much media power it's time to break up the media empires in america that are corrupting our democracy bring back the sherman act and bust up the media monopolies and require networks that call themselves news to actually be reporting the news only then can we once and for all pay no attention to that man behind the curtain destroying our news media and only then can we as a nation break free from this cancer of infotainment and murdoch style pseudo news it's hiding what's really going on in america the corporate takeover of our democracy. as the big picture for tonight for more information on the stories we covered visit our website to tom hartman dot com free speech dot org an archie dot com also check out our two you tube channels there are links to thom hartmann to this entire show is also available as a free video podcast on i tunes and we have a free tom hartman i phone an i pad app of the app store you sent us feedback on twitter at tom underscore hartman on facebook at tom underscore our blogs message boards and telephone comment why it's all more of

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